118 PROFESSOR SIR W. TURNER ON 



brachycephalic proportions in some of the existing aboriginal Dravidian tribes, but the 

 direct evidence of either a past or a present Negrito population in India has yet to be 

 obtained.* 



Sakai. Table X. 



The name Sakai is given to aboriginal people dwelling in the hill regions in the 

 Malay peninsula. Since the early part of the century certain tribes called Semangs 

 have been described in Kedah to the north of Pinang and in Tringanu on the east coast. 

 Anderson speaks of a native of Kedah as 4 ft. 6 in. in height, the hair woolly and 

 tufted, the skin jet black, the lips thick, the nose flat, the belly protuberant as in the 

 Andaman Islanders. J. R. Logan states that a tribe of Semangs in the hills opposite 

 Pinang have a stature from 4 ft. 8 in. to 4 ft. 10 in., the nose with depressed root and 

 spreading alas, the skin dark brown though sometimes lighter, but black where most 

 exposed, f The Russian traveller, v. Miklucho-Maclay, became acquainted with people 

 named Orang Sakai in his journey through Johore in 1874-75. He stated that 

 the hair consisted of very fine curls, arranged in a compact mass projecting for a short 

 distance from the head, and formed a good guide to the purity of the race. J He re- 

 garded the people as Melanesians, though they approached the Negritos of the Philip- 

 pines. The height of the men varied from 1450 to 1650 mm. (4 ft. 7 in. to 5 ft. 4 in.), 

 and the heads were mesocephalic to brachycephalic. M. de Quatrefages figured § from 

 photographs natives, said to be Sakais from Perak, in one of whom the hair was smooth 

 and in two others was frizzled. Mr Abraham Hale has seen the Sakai people in the 

 Kintah district of Perak, and has given an account || of many of their customs. He 

 states that an ancient race the Semangs are also found in Perak, on the right bank of 

 the Perak river, whilst the Sakais inhabit the left bank. 



Hale did not describe the physical characters of the Sakai, but stated that their 

 primitive dress consisted of bark cloth twisted round the waist and drawn between the 

 thighs. The nasal septum was pierced to wear a porcupine quill or a bone, and the ears 

 were often pierced. The women had the hair standing out from the head in a great 

 mop ; they wore bracelets, and ornamented the face and breast with red figures. The 

 Kelantan Sakais from the north-east were finer-looking men than those in the Kintah 

 district. 



At the instigation of Professor Vtrchow, Mr Vaughan Stevens travelled in the eastern 



* After this Memoir was in type I received, through the courtesy of Major Bannerman, M.D., the Madras 

 Christian College Magazine for September and October 1900, in which is an article by Mr C. Hayavadawa Rau, B.A., 

 on the origin of the Servile Classes and Hill Tribes of South India. In this article Mr Rau discusses, from the 

 physical, social, linguistic and intellectual points of view, the Negrito theory of the origin of the Dravidians, and regards 

 the theory as untenable. He draws the inference that all the indigenous tribes foimd by the Aryan immigrants in 

 Southern India belonged substantially to one and the same Dravidian race. 



t These accounts are abstracted in G. W. Earl's work on the Native Races of the Indian Archipelago, London, 1853. 



I Verh. der Berliner Ges.fiir Anth., etc., 1876 and 1891, p. 837 ; Joum. of Straits Branch of Royal Asiatic Soc, 1878. 

 § Les Pygm&s, Paris, 1887, pp. 54, 55. 



II Journal of Anth. Institute, vol. xv. p. 285, 1886. 



